In 1634, the Thirty Years' War had taken a spectacular turn; the great
protagonists of 1630 had died: King Gustav Adolf of Sweden and Generals
Tilly and Wallenstein. The Swedish army was disoriented without the
presence of its charismatic king. Chancellor Oxenstierna was to preserve
his legacy, so the Heilbronn League was formed, with various Protestant
states in western and northern Germany, and the French financial
support.
With this, the Swedish-Protestants were able to launch various
offensives throughout Germany, almost collapsing the Imperial forces,
which were organizing even after the earthquake caused by the murder of
Wallenstein. The King of Hungary Ferdinand, heir to the Holy Roman
Empire, decided to assume command of the armies in the West and thus
enhance his leadership.
Cardinal-Infante Fernando had been appointed governor of Flanders; but
the sea voyage from Spain to Flanders was threatened by storms, the
English, the French, and the Dutch. It was much safer to travel from
Italy and travel more than 1,000 km through the so-called Spanish Road.
But this route, which partly followed the course of the River Rhine, was
now on the front lines of the Thirty Years' War. Prince Fernando could
not travel alone, so an army of 10,000 soldiers was formed to escort him
and then fight against Holland.
Ferdinand asked the Cardinal-Infante to help him conquer a small town,
called Nördlingen, and together they could fight a Swedish-German army,
commanded by Generals Gustav Horn and Bernard of Saxe-Weimar.
This book explains the general situation in Germany during the Thirty
Years' War in the period 1633-1634. It describes in detail the tactics,
armament and units of the Spanish, Swedish and Imperial armies. Analyze
the conflicting interests of the various powers fighting the war.
The objective of the text is to explain the battle that took place in
the plain of Nördlingen, the various protagonists who commanded the
Tercios and Regiments that fought there; analyze the mistakes and
successes of the generals. With all this, the stereotypes about the
Spanish and Swedish tactical models are reviewed, which for a long time
were the paradigm of tactics in European battle theaters. In this way,
it seeks to answer which deployment was better, if the Swedish Brigades,
or the Spanish Tercios.
